Immigrant voters may influence close election

By Timothy Pratt (contact)

Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2004 | 11:13 a.m.

Immigrants who have become citizens -- a group that is fast-growing, registers to vote in increasing numbers, and votes in even higher numbers -- may play an important role in battleground states such as Nevada in the upcoming elections, a recent report said.

The report, titled "Power and Potential: the Growing Electoral Clout of New Citizens," was compiled by the Washington-based Immigration Policy Center. It uses U.S. Census Bureau numbers to show:

These numbers add up to an "astounding growth of new citizens participating in the political process," said Rob Paral, the report's main author.

Benjamin Johnson, who also contributed to the report, said that Nevada, which registered a 200 percent increase in the foreign-born population between 1990 and 2000, is "certainly a state where the growth and the size of the new citizen population is such that they are going to play an important role in the upcoming election."

Andres Ramirez, state director for Voices for Working Families, a group that registers minorities, said, "I've been telling people for a couple of years that Nevada could play a unique role because of the size of the foreign-born population, the higher rates of citizenship, and the fact that this population seems to vote at a higher percentage."

He also said the number of foreign-born voters was "probably even higher now."

Elsa Garcia, a Clark County Election Department administrator and the person in charge of outreach to Hispanics -- the largest population of foreign-born voters -- said her personal and professional experience has shown her that so-called new citizens register and vote in high numbers.

"My parents registered and immediately went out to vote as soon as they became citizens in the 1970s," she said. Garcia's parents are from Mexico.

Garcia has seen the same tendency whenever she oversees the election department's work registering voters among newly sworn-in citizens at the George Federal Building.

"They're proud that they've reached the first step ... and eager to participate in their new country's political process," she said.

Garcia said this may have to do with the perception that their vote counts more in the United States than in their native countries.

"They often come from countries ... where elections are pretty much a done deal," she said.

Ramirez said his group's search for new voters requires him to hire workers that speak the same languages spoken in the Las Vegas Valley's immigrant community, including Spanish, Chinese and Tagalog.

Johnson said the immigrant community, while registering to vote in high numbers in recent years, still has a larger percentage of people that are not registered than the general population.

He said local and national government agencies could play a larger role in educating "new citizens" about the electoral process and encouraging them to register and vote, including in partnership with nonprofit or community groups like Voices for Working Families.

Though the group Ramirez directs is nonpartisan, he said that both parties should be keeping a close eye on the foreign-born voter in the upcoming election.

"Most immigrants," Ramirez said, "don't have established loyalties to political parties.

"That means their vote is up for grabs."